Local History Research Skills Seminar on The Sack of Balbriggan

Posted on September 16, 2017

In 2020 the Centenary of the Sack of Balbriggan will take place and Balbriggan & District Historical Society are planning a series of events in the lead up to this. We would like to see further research done on this topic in the next few years and to that end we hosted a half day seminar, in association with Balbriggan Library, on how to do Historical Research.

The following were the speakers:
Brian Gallagher who has recently published a teenager’s historical novel Pawns, set during the Sack Of Balbriggan
Íde Ní Liathain, Balbriggan Library who will speak about the resources Fingal Libraries have for research
Brendan Matthews well known Community Historian who has published a book on the Sack of Balbriggan. He will give a general overview of the Sack and topics for further research and will bring along primary sources, such as newspaper clips to the talk.

The wealth of information to be found in newspapers was stressed by Brendan Matthews, particularly in relation to what else was happening in the period that you were researching, or how you could follow a thread from one snippet in a paper to checking the census etc. Ide illustrated the many resources available in the Library such as the many journals available on Jstor or the information you could research at home on sites such as http://www.bureauofmilitaryhistory.ie/ If you have some family connection with the Sack of Balbriggan or any other local history, or if you are interested in how to learn about it, be sure to get in touch and we will help you research it further.